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>>political discourse has turned to be very divisive and tribal. You are either with us, or against us. This is because much of politics is currently driven by

by toss1 5y ago

>>political discourse has turned to be very divisive and tribal. You are either with us, or against us. This is because much of politics is currently driven by a global set of fascist/authoritarian govts and sponsored 'movements' pushing to destroy democracy. This is, IMO, back to the pre-cold war days, but stripped of all the "--isms" and ideologies. It is now either self-determination for the people via democracy, or live under rulers like Putin, stripped of any cloking ideology. This is being strongly pushed/sponsored globally by Putin's govt; the Chinese are going about it differently with the 'Belt & Road' initiative and other exploitative agreements. The grand experiment has been tried. It was thought that free trade exchanges and greater information flow from free nations would cause freedom, self-determination, & democracy to the former Communist nations. It did not. In trying to prove the thesis, the test proved the opposite, and enriched the authoritarian states. Russia's ongoing assault on Ukraine since 24-Feb-2022, and the ongoing blatant war crimes including specific instructions to ignore civilian care[0], cluster munitions on civilian targets[1], or bombing a theater/shelter with "Children" written on the pavement outside [2], and it's support by ~70% of the deluded RUS population, show what can be expected from yielding to or appeasing authoritarianism. It now really IS you are with us, or against us. You are either in favor of democratic self-rule for all people, or you are against it. This is war, and we are fighting against those who are happy to be war criminals. It is important to take every measure, and "weaponizing" open source is among the least of the things that can be done to help. [0] https://twitter.com/cnsnews/status/1504494016137555968?cxt=HHwWgMCj6cTVhOEpAAAA https://twitter.com/cnsnews/status/1504494016137555968?cxt=H... [1] https://www.bellingcat.com/news/rest-of-world/2022/03/11/these-are-the-cluster-munitions-documented-by-ukrainian-civilians/ https://www.bellingcat.com/news/rest-of-world/2022/03/11/the... [2] https://www.npr.org/2022/03/17/1087164709/ukraine-mariupol-theater-bombing https://www.npr.org/2022/03/17/1087164709/ukraine-mariupol-t...

walrusfromspace 5y ago
>You are either in favor of democratic self-rule for all people, or you are against it. So can I assume that you were protesting against Spain's suppression of the Catalan independence referendum in 2017? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalan_independence_movement#2017_Referendum,_Declaration_of_Independence_and_new_regional_elections https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalan_independence_movement#...
- diordiderot 5y ago
  Hell yeah! Then Scotland and basque country
- toss1 5y ago
  Living on a different continent, I'm relatively unfamiliar with the details, but with the information I have, I do support Catalan independence. The Spanish police reaction detailed in your linked article tells us much and gives reason in itself to support it. (The only thing that would change my mind is sound information that it is not the a grassroots people's movement that it appears and is instead some sponsored fascist movement like Brexit)
Jiro 5y ago
If Russia stopped bombing places with "children" written on them, Ukraine would just write "children" on important places that they didn't want to be bombed.
- toss1 5y ago
  It was a f*king theater, and a known shelter. And no, they would not. IIRC disguising military locations as civilian, or using civilians as human shields is itself a war crime. The Ukranians are not doing that. What's your excuse for the maternity hospital? Firing on civilians in a prearranged exit route/cease-fire? Cluster-bombing civilian areas? I could go on for pages and pages, and the War Crimes case is already starting, and being substantiated up to the level that the POTUS and SecState are specifically speaking of Putin as a "War Criminal". Thanks for demonstrating my point about the how otherwise intelligent people can still have insane levels of self-absorbed myopia and inability to understand moral issues, and lack of perspective. You need a serious rethink. Yikes
  - TMWNN 5y ago
    > IIRC disguising military locations as civilian, or using civilians as human shields is itself a war crime. The Ukranians are not doing that. Ukraine publicizing Russian prisoners of war is a violation of the Geneva Conventions (<https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/03/16/ukraine-respect-rights-prisoners-war https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/03/16/ukraine-respect-rights-p...>), yet that keeps occurring. Your being so certain that, if Russia did not fire on locations marked as being filled with "children", that Ukraine would never ever put soldiers in them, may be misplaced.
    - BlueTemplar 5y ago
      It's not about never ever, it's about bad behaviour not being normalized. This far from the first time that this kind of deliberate violation has been done by Russia. Also, the doxxing of prisoners, while bad, is on a whole different level than these.
BlueTemplar 5y ago
An "ism" is always involved, pretty hard to otherwise convince a whole country to go to war... Even if the "ism" in question is mostly just about power : https://www.telospress.com/cornelius-castoriadis-on-russian-society/ https://www.telospress.com/cornelius-castoriadis-on-russian-... If this is about specifically Putin possibly not believing in anything than power - (his claims to care about Russians are hard to believe considering how they are a majority in several of the currently bombed cities) - then the same thing could have been blamed about Stalin already.

by toss1 5y ago

walrusfromspace 5y ago

>You are either in favor of democratic self-rule for all people, or you are against it. So can I assume that you were protesting against Spain's suppression of the Catalan independence referendum in 2017? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalan_independence_movement#2017_Referendum,_Declaration_of_Independence_and_new_regional_elections https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalan_independence_movement#...

diordiderot 5y ago
Hell yeah! Then Scotland and basque country
toss1 5y ago
Living on a different continent, I'm relatively unfamiliar with the details, but with the information I have, I do support Catalan independence. The Spanish police reaction detailed in your linked article tells us much and gives reason in itself to support it. (The only thing that would change my mind is sound information that it is not the a grassroots people's movement that it appears and is instead some sponsored fascist movement like Brexit)

Jiro 5y ago

If Russia stopped bombing places with "children" written on them, Ukraine would just write "children" on important places that they didn't want to be bombed.

toss1 5y ago
It was a f*king theater, and a known shelter. And no, they would not. IIRC disguising military locations as civilian, or using civilians as human shields is itself a war crime. The Ukranians are not doing that. What's your excuse for the maternity hospital? Firing on civilians in a prearranged exit route/cease-fire? Cluster-bombing civilian areas? I could go on for pages and pages, and the War Crimes case is already starting, and being substantiated up to the level that the POTUS and SecState are specifically speaking of Putin as a "War Criminal". Thanks for demonstrating my point about the how otherwise intelligent people can still have insane levels of self-absorbed myopia and inability to understand moral issues, and lack of perspective. You need a serious rethink. Yikes
- TMWNN 5y ago
  > IIRC disguising military locations as civilian, or using civilians as human shields is itself a war crime. The Ukranians are not doing that. Ukraine publicizing Russian prisoners of war is a violation of the Geneva Conventions (<https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/03/16/ukraine-respect-rights-prisoners-war https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/03/16/ukraine-respect-rights-p...>), yet that keeps occurring. Your being so certain that, if Russia did not fire on locations marked as being filled with "children", that Ukraine would never ever put soldiers in them, may be misplaced.
  - BlueTemplar 5y ago
    It's not about never ever, it's about bad behaviour not being normalized. This far from the first time that this kind of deliberate violation has been done by Russia. Also, the doxxing of prisoners, while bad, is on a whole different level than these.

BlueTemplar 5y ago

An "ism" is always involved, pretty hard to otherwise convince a whole country to go to war... Even if the "ism" in question is mostly just about power : https://www.telospress.com/cornelius-castoriadis-on-russian-society/ https://www.telospress.com/cornelius-castoriadis-on-russian-... If this is about specifically Putin possibly not believing in anything than power - (his claims to care about Russians are hard to believe considering how they are a majority in several of the currently bombed cities) - then the same thing could have been blamed about Stalin already.